Through a mist of preoccupation she was aware that he was addressing her.
‘Mrs Veal.’
‘Yes?’ She paused and her small mouth hung open like a little bag which someone had forgotten to fasten. ‘Yes?’
The reporter said in a depressed voice: ‘Could you tell me your emotions, just simply and – and simply, when your ship came ashore. It is unusual to have a – a lady aboard and I’m most anxious to get a woman’s point of view.’
She looked at him with contempt. ‘All my life, fate has deprived me … loved ones have fallen by the way. By the way, Mr – er … It has been my misfortune. NOT my fault. I do not complain. My dear, dear sister in the flower of her youth. My dear mother when her advice, most needed. My good, kind husband. I am. Lonely woman. Stricken with sorrow. My husband’s first wife, she often said to me, “ Madge, you look bowed with secret grief.” It was the truth. Only Perry felt and understood. He alone knew what it was.’
The reporter fidgeted and glanced towards the door. He had not been taking notes.
‘That’s very, very sad, madam. Naturally we always regret intruding upon –’
‘Unusual,’ said Mrs Veal doggedly. ‘The one who stands out. Always picked at by the herd. An unusual woman. Hi often think. Destined. One does not know. The end is yet to be.’
‘Yes, yes,’ he said.
‘The end is yet to be! Mr-er … Put that in your paper. Joan of Arc did not know. Jeanne d’Arc. Envious men may deny me … Right of speech is mine. Always remember that, right of speech. Don’t go,’ she said as he made a movement to rise; and so sharply did she speak that for the moment he accepted her veto: ‘Don’t go. I have much to tell you. Afterwards. You’ll be glad.’
Pat found herself back on the sofa in that musty old parlour of the Tavern Inn. She didn’t know how she had got there, and Tom was trying to persuade her to drink something from a glass.
She sat up. ‘I’m all right. I’m all right. It – just made me sick.’
He sat back upon his heels and waited quietly for her to recover. A sudden gust of wind boomed down the chimney and shook the old building in its depths. He saw now that her colour was returning.
He felt it particularly unfitting that he should have had to strike this final blow. Patricia, for all her slenderness and youth, had always been so inwardly strong and self-sufficient; while he, outwardly confident enough, had never been really confident in her presence. (Or only once, and that had been when his desire for her had outweighed his deference.)
That had been one of the stumbling blocks in their relationship, but the fact that she was down at last brought him no comfort or satisfaction. He raged against the circumstances which had weighted the dice against her. In the space of two years she had lost both her parents; her marriage had come to grief; the standard of life she had grown used to had been overthrown, the money rightly hers had been given to someone else. She had gone out to earn her living among strangers. But now something was upon her less bearable than any of the foregoing. Something crooked and unclean and not to be thought of. But something which would have to be thought of. In the next few days and weeks it would take a larger and larger place in her life until there would be room for nothing else. Then, perhaps it would be in three months, perhaps six, the bubble of talk and trial and publicity would be pricked and she would be left to herself again, empty and neglected and alone. Alone but with a stigma of talk and rumour still clinging to her like cobwebs from a sewer. Wherever she went they would go, casting an unrelenting stain over her cleanness and her youth. ‘Oh, do you know who that is staying with you, Mrs So-and-So? Patricia Veal: you remember, the Falmouth poisoning case. No, she was only a step-daughter, but of course they were a peculiar family. I’ve heard it said-mm-mm-mm-mm …’
That was her future unless … He realised that this was the very first time since she left him that they were alone together and she not trying to get away. He wished he could somehow heal the wound his words had inflicted, a wound which was going deeper with every minute that her brain worked, here alone with him in the lamplight. They were alone together but that counted for nothing.
He said: ‘When this is over … It’ll take time, Pat, obviously it will take time. When this is over … Oh, I know this isn’t the time; there couldn’t be a worse. But I may not get another opportunity.’ He still sat on his heels beside her. She made no response. ‘This … all this trouble that’s coming. We could help each other. It’s bound to be hard to get through alone. Life’s pretty rotten for you since your father died; it will stay rotten for a time. Afterwards … I’ve had an offer of a partnership in Cape Town. All South Africa’s unsettled. Two things it needs are honest politics and honest law. I’m going to take the chance. There we could really start afresh, really afresh. The past could be more easily forgotten. We’re both young. We can wipe things out and begin again.’
His voice, which had become eager and moving, tailed off. He looked at her.
‘Perry,’ she said. ‘Was he in it? His own brother. That’s the hardest of all … to understand.’
He got up, sat on the edge of the couch, leaned his head on his hand. The moment was gone.
Neither of them knew how long passed before she said: ‘ What made … you suspect?’
‘Oh …’ He tried to bring back his thoughts to the subject which, until he had seen her, had prominently occupied them. ‘Something about your father. His appearance wasn’t quite natural. The clumsy way he handled things as if there wasn’t much feeling in his fingertips; the look of his skin. Then I’d been reading for an examination in criminal law. Not that I suspected anyone in particular at first. Thought perhaps he took some sort of drug. I … didn’t see enough of him and there was nobody I could inquire from.’
‘When was this?’
‘I noticed it particularly the first time I saw him after you had gone back.’
Two men were mounting their farm horses outside in the square. You could hear them talking to the horses, shouting to each other, then the lumbering clop-clop of iron hooves on cobbles.
‘Go on.’
‘I might have done more. I wish now I had, but I was very unsure then. And I’d quarrelled with him and wasn’t on speaking terms with you. I dropped one or two hints to you, but you naturally thought I was only trying to scare you into coming back. It was dangerous to start talking outside. I made one or two inquiries about your mother …’
‘Oh, dear God!’ she said. It was a cry of pure distress. He took her hand and held it.
‘Oh, Tom!’ she said. ‘Oh, Tom!’
They sat there for a long time in silence. Presently tears began to run down her cheeks. ‘Don’t cry, Pat,’ he kept whispering. ‘Don’t cry, Pat.’
He forced himself to go on, trying to pick his way.
‘After – after your father’s death I began to feel there must be something, some cause. I went to see the doctor concerned, but of course he would tell me nothing. What sealed everything was the Will. I felt there was no doubt then. When your father made that Will he signed his own death warrant – forgive me for being blunt. But I was very relieved when you didn’t come in for the money. I had been afraid that you might be next. That’s why I hoped no later Will would be found. That’s why I plotted and schemed to get you away from the house, out of danger.’
‘Thank God I haven’t been to see her,’ she said through her tears.
‘At last I got the police interested. Inquiries were made at likely shops. Nothing led anywhere. Anthony gave us the clue. He said one day that he did a lot of shopping for her. When he went through the list we at last came to – to flypapers. He’d bought them at various shops in the district, twice at Penryn, once even at St Mawes, though none had been bought since late August. Inquiries were made about the type bought and an analysis made of them. Each one contains enough poison to kill a man. That gave the police evidence to take action.’
He still held her hand and she made no attempt to release
it. She needed companionship in the dark.
‘What are they going to do now?’
‘The police? Nothing until tomorrow. They haven’t quite finished all … all the reports haven’t come through yet.’
She said half passionately, half fearfully: ‘I wish it was tomorrow. I wish it was tomorrow.’
In the bar Ben Blatchford and the younger reporter were still standing side by side at the counter, although there had not been much conversation between them since the other man left. Two miners had walked in from a neighbouring village and were being regaled not only with beer, but with a lively account of the day’s pickings in flotsam. The captain of the rocket crew, while not taking a prominent part in the discussion, was listening with an attentive smile. The reporter was reading through the notes he had made.
He felt a touch behind him and found his colleague had come back.
‘Any luck?’ he asked.
The other man shook his head and began to polish his glasses. ‘Hopeless. Couldn’t make head nor tail of her.’
‘You got to see her, then?’
‘She wouldn’t talk sense. You know the sort: you ask a straightforward question and they go off into the story of their lives. Death beds of all her nearest relatives, with details of what they died of. She kept on burbling about being misunderstood and nobody loving her. I think she’s got a mash on this fellow who was drowned. But as soon as I turned the conversation on that she was up and away about something else. Couldn’t pin her down.
We’ll rig up some sort of a story, but I made my excuses as quick as I could.’
‘What now, then?’
‘We ought to catch the midnight train from Truro. Look, I’m going to have a shot at interviewing the mate, who’s been put up at a cottage across the way. You got all you can out of this man?’
‘Ye-es. I think so. But there was one thing. These notes –’
‘Get a photo of him if you can. It’ll fill up. I’ll be back in twenty minutes.’
Left to himself again, the younger reporter read his notes again. This was his first assignment and he didn’t want to fall down on it. He looked at his watch. Then he touched Blatchford on the sleeve.
The old man turned and regarded him with eyes which had grown more friendly and benevolent as the night advanced.
‘Yes, boy?’
‘Many thanks, Mr Blatchford, you’ve been very helpful. Do you happen to have a photograph of yourself, free of copyright, that you could let us have?’
‘Well, boy, I’ve a snap that was took last August month of the whole rocket crew, and I’m thur wi’ the rest. ’Ow would that do, eh? I don’t know whether ’tis free of what you say, but I’ll not charge ye fur it.’
‘Thanks. That would do very well. We’re leaving soon, so perhaps you could get it for us? The – er – I … in looking through these notes it’s occurred to me there seems a slight contradiction, so to say, between – er …’ Under the keen eye which was now turned on him he stammered and hesitated; men he gathered courage and plunged on. ‘Look, Mr Blatchford, earlier when we began to talk, I have it down here that you said there wasn’t a moment to lose in saving these people from the wreck.’
‘Nor was there. Nor was there.’
‘No, certainly; very good. But you said – mind you I’m only trying to clear the matter up – in speaking of the boy you say that he was saved later, much later, by a rescue party which boarded the ship, and you spoke as if it was only natural that he should be. I suppose that’s all right; but if as you said every minute was precious –’
‘So ’twas. So ’twas.’ The tough weather-beaten face twisted slightly and the jeyes glinted. ‘Precious to we. We always get a pound for every life we saave bi’ the rocket. They was safe enough where they were if the ship didn’t break up. Naturally the ship might’ve broke up, but we was anxious to get ’ em off whether or no. Tide was goin’ out fast. In another hour they’d ’ave been able to walk ashore.’ Blatchford exchanged a few words of farewell to a friend leaving the bar. Then he turned back to the reporter. ‘Now ’tis real nice to’ve seen you gentlemen, but you’ll be careful not to put that in your papers, won’t you. Folks might think it read straange. But I’m an honest man and you ast me an honest question. Sometimes things do work out straange round these shores, and it’s no fault of we as’ve lived ’ereabouts all our lives.’
After the reporter had gone Aunt Madge went back to her seat by the fire, aware that she had been casting pearls before swine. She was sorry she’d wasted her breath in trying to explain as much as she had; the man had no soul above the common herd. You could not expect such a man to be sensitive and understanding when so few people had the quality of brain to appreciate her confidences. Only Perry had fully shared her way of thought. Perry and she had been soul mates. In the maelstrom of the Cornish sea he had been lost, and she would never see him more. The thought was a deep grief to her.
True, there was still a faint, uneasy memory that all had not been quite well between them at the end, that in his courageous effort to save her he had appeared distraught; but her brain was rapidly disposing of this remembrance. Each time she thought of it the lines were less distinct, the occurrence lit by a softer light.
Soon she would forget it altogether, having convinced herself that it was unimportant and did not affect the deep, rich stream of their love and understanding. Only Perry had known all. Or not quite all, but she thought he understood all. One day soon she had been going to tell him everything in a burst of confidence. Now it would never be.
In the cottage opposite the bespectacled reporter was busy taking notes and wondering how to describe Mr O’Brien’s accent. Just once or twice while he listened to the mate’s ready flow and contrasted its factual pungency with Mrs Veal’s windy hesitations there came to him a twinge of uneasiness, such as he sometimes had when he went to a racing meeting and on impulse put his money on another horse from the one he had all along intended backing: a sort of mental dyspepsia of second thoughts.
Not that he was aware of having missed something which would illuminate his story of the wreck, but he felt once or twice that a cleverer man might have been able to turn her peculiar personality to some account. She was a bore, but an unusual bore. He had watched her closely at first, and listened closely, keen to catch the thread of sense which must lie behind it all. Then he had failed and lost interest and become impatient.
So Madge Veal sat by the fire with her secrets still safe and the reporter made up his story with the larger part of the story left out. Later he would bite his nails in fury and regret.
He might have comforted himself when the time came by reflecting that he failed to understand her where cleverer men had failed. Where all men would fail who tried to assess her behaviour by their own.
For her brain was like a dusty room which had had its doors all locked and barred, a room in which the air had grown stale and noxious for lack of contact with the outer air. Her egoism provided the bolts and keys, sealing up the smallest crack whereby there could be any contact between other people’s ethics and her own. Within this room her commonplace, rodent, dangerous personality had had its living and being, like a prisoner free within limits, building up its self-deceptions, concocting its own excuses, imagining its own triumphs, plotting its own satisfactions, growing large and fat and white like a slug under a stone.
Only during the last few days – for the first time for years – events, especially the news Anthony brought, had burst open some of the doors and left them want only swinging. She had hastened to press them to again, her etiolated mind recoiling at the touch of the cold air. She had fought then like a querulous invalid from whom the bedclothes had been pulled away, fought tooth and nail to cover and protect herself again. She had succeeded, but only by admitting the existence of disturbing facts inside the protective screen. Even now they were still there, and Perry had been insistent that they were of a nature which would not remain sterile but would grow and develo
p and have a fruition of their own.
It had needed hard thinking to put them in their place.
That was why she had felt lonely and off her balance tonight. That was why she had said so much to the stupid staring reporter, talking in spite of herself, ventilating the stored complaints of a lifetime, justifying herself, pitying herself, inviting his commendation of her behaviour, using him in some degree as her confidant. It didn’t matter. No harm was done. He had taken nothing in. The mere fact of having been able to talk to a man and of feeling herself so greatly his mental superior had had a reassuring effect; that and the relief of having talked it all out had brought reassurance. Before the comforting warmth of the fire and the self-supporting glow of these reflections she began to doze.
She was very tired. As she dozed she thought of her sister, a tall, comely girl who had had all the good looks of the family. Half dreaming and half waking, she thought of the strange way in which her sister had lost her good looks before she died; her cheeks had sunk and so much of her beautiful fair hair had come out; the family were renowned for their fair hair; her mother had retained it to the end. She thought of her mother, and how one year she had been essential to her well-being, the next superfluous, the next obnoxious, and the fourth she had not been at all; her death had been quite sudden. One, two, three, four, the years had peeled off like ripe plums falling from a tree; like flies falling from a flypaper.
She began to think of flypapers and of flies dying and dropping off them like the years. And in her sleepy mind she began to confuse people and flies, flies and people, so that each had the same relative importance to herself. Sometimes before she had done this; it was a convenient way out of many a moral impasse; her thoughts often repeated themselves in this way, working their way into grooves and sophistries of their own. The older she grew the more unreal became the affairs of other people, the easier it was to reduce the concerns of all living things outside herself to a common level of triviality and unimportance.